In the past, loading of stock in pick-up trucks has required the use of separate, wheeled, loading chutes which have been kept at the point of loading or trailered to the point of use. This has necessitated inconvenience and expense through the separate wheeled chute trailer and has hampered loading efficiency through the obvious difficulty in hook up and trailer.
While self-contained truck chutes have been designed, these have been integrally designed to fit under a permanent bed of large stock type trucks rather than pick-ups and are permanent parts of the truck structure.
There has long been a need for providing a ready means for loading stock in pick-up trucks which are more widely used in general farming and ranching use than any other type of truck. Desirably such loading means has been sought by a readily available loading chute which can be assembled as needed and employed in rough terrain wherever the stock to be loaded are to be found.
Such need of easily assembled chutes has existed for use with stock racks of the floor supported type as well as those fitted on the side walls of the truck bed. For general loading use such stock racks have also encountered a problem in loading or unloading of stock from docks having different structures. While such stock racks conventionally have been provided with tail gates that may be raised vertically to open the gate this does not fit all loading conditions. Some loading conditions make such raising of a gate difficult or undesirable and there has been a need to open the gate by swinging inwardly or outwardly and the gates provided in the past have not provided such adaptable opening and loading provisions.